Interactive television enables a viewer to exchange information via a television, and thus enjoy an interactive viewing experience. Interactive television systems traditionally indicate an availability of interactive content within a television signal. When the television signal is received and the indication of interactive content detected, an icon is typically displayed on a viewer's display to indicate the available interactive content. The icon may be selected via a remote control to launch the interactive application.
Encoding the indication of the interactive content via the video signal introduces additional processing and complexity to the function of sending the video signal. Furthermore, requiring the encoding for each interactive application into the video signal may create a bottleneck to developing and distributing new interactive applications.